devistation beond belief

[Gary Shallbetter]

I went to Pine Island sat and sunday to help with the clean up and could not get over the devistation. As I went under the Sanibel bridge I was instantly stopped by the law and asked were I was going. As I was giving the info to the officer there was an army black hawk hovering approx 400 yards off my stern. The law is not playing with anyone down here. I reached the canal to my folks house and there was so much debris in the water I had to trim high in case i hit parts of homes, boats and you name it. The trees are snapped off like tooth picks, boats thrown on roofs, sunk and flipped. The aluminum from car ports and siding is strung through the trees and power lines like tissue paper on halloween. You would not believe how much debries I put in my Mako that I found floating on the way up there. Next weekend we are bringing our boats to Port Charlotte to help clean the water ways. After seeing this first hand I will think twice about bitching about anything. These people need help and if there is anything that I can do I will and I hope you will do the same. Even if its a 5 dollar donation to the Red Cross it helps. You never know, the next time it could be one of our comunitys.

[Capt. Andy]

Gary , planing on running my boat down there to captiva on this thursday aug. 19

Is there anything you can think of i can bring or do to help ???? thanks Andy

[Gary Shallbetter]

Hi Andy,

Captiva was cut in half. You are not going to beleive it. I think the best thing to do is to call the Red Cross before you go and ask them. Where are you coming from?

[tank72]

relief effort

http://outdoorsbest.zeroforum.com/zerothread?id=242082

[Capt. Andy]

Coming from venice

[Sailor]

quote:

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Originally posted by Gary Shallbetter


Ithere was so much debris in the water I had to trim high in case i hit parts of homes, boats and you name it.

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When Opal hit up here, there were several reports of lower units being ripped off from boaters running in normmally safe waters and they never saw the metal dumpsters that were washed out. Boat safely in that area for some time to come.